SOLIDARITY TRIAL

Oct. 18, 2020

The World Health Organization (WHO) made available interim results from the Solidarity Therapeutics Trial. The findings put a dampener on expectations from these therapies — including remdesivir, once seen as promising.

About:

  • Solidarity Trial is the world’s “largest” multinational human trials on Covid-19 therapeutics. It was initiated by WHO and its partners in March to help find an effective treatment for Covid-19.

  • It covers four repurposed drugs or drug combinations — remdesivir, hydroxychloroquine, lopinavir/ritonavir and interferon (in combination with rotinavir and lopinavir).

  • The main aim was to help determine whether any of these repurposed therapies could at least moderately affect in-hospital mortality, and whether any effects differed between moderate and severe disease, said Dr Sheela Godbole, national coordinator of the Solidarity Trial in India.

  • The initiative included 26 trials in parts of India with a high burden of cases.

  • Drugs like hyrdoxychloroquine and lopinavir, in fact, had already been dropped over the course of the last six months for not showing much promise.